Les Blanchisseuses.
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of a mile you can see well exemplified one natural law of life's struggle,—the best chances to the best constitutions. Y o u might also observe, if you watch long enough, that among the blanchisseuses there are few sufficiently light of color to be classed as bright mulâtresses ;—the majority are black or of that dark copper-red race which is perhaps superior to the black Creole in strength and bulk ; for it requires a skin insensible to sun as well as the toughest of constitutions to be a blanchisseuse. A porteuse can begin to make long trips at nine or ten years ; but no girl is strong enough to learn the washing-trade until she is past twelve. T h e blanchisseuse is the hardest worker among the whole population ;—her daily labor is rarely less than thirteen hours ; and during the greater part of that time she is working in the sun, and standing up to her knees in water that descends quite cold from the mountain peaks. Her labor makes her perspire profusely ; and she can never venture to cool herself by further immersion without serious danger of pleurisy. The trade is said to kill all who continue at it beyond a certain number of years :—"Nou ka mb toutt dleau " (we all die of the water), one told me, replying to a question. No feeble or light-skinned person can attempt to do a single day's work of this kind without danger ; and a weak girl, driven by necessity to d o her own washing, seldom ventures to g o to the river. Yet I saw an instance of such rashness one day. A pretty sang-mêlée, perhaps about eighteen or nineteen years old,—whom I afterwards learned had just lost her mother and found herself thus absolutely destitute,— began to descend one of the flights of stone steps leading to the river, with a small bundle upon her head ; and two or three of the blanchisseuses stopped their work to look at her. A tall capresse inquired mischievously :—